Laughing, Eleanor waved his compliment away. “Do not be fooled by a calm demeanor. Not only am I determined to discover the truth of what is happening here, I am now resolved that we shall discover it first. Although he surely did not mean to do so, Leonel offended with his easy dismissal of your worth to this undertaking.” She looked up and down the hall. No one was nearby. “I have questions.”
“Ask them, my lady. I shall bring my few wits to join in your effort.” He leaned against the wall and waited.
“We have debated the implications and details of these recent tragic deaths to little avail, so let us start at a different point. What if the source of the current troubles is to be found in the distant past, not during the baron’s time in Acre? You have told me what Baron Herbert said on the way to Outremer about his sons, but what do you remember from earlier years? How then did he act with them and what opinions did he hold? You visited here when you were not much older than a boy yourself, and we often note things better when we are young, even when we do not understand the implications.”
He folded his arms and stared at the ceiling for a long moment. “The baron has changed little over the years. To his mind, truth is unchanging, including the definition of honor and duty. To doubt this or say otherwise is second only to blasphemy. His concept of how men of rank should behave is narrowly defined, and his sons were expected to concur with his view.” Hugh paused. “As boys, they failed to show ardor in ways he thought they should.”
“Truth comes from God. As such, it is both perfect and eternal,” she replied. “But men are flawed creatures, often confusing their imperfect views with His. The greatest of God’s truths is the need for charity. Did he never exercise compassion with his babes?”
Hugh shook his head. “Whether he is right or wrong, the baron believes his way is God’s. Yet he is an honorable man, despite a dour and unbending nature. He adores his wife. His loyalty to friends and liege lord is fierce.” Touching his chest, he added, “Despite our disagreements in certain matters, he would remain at my side in battle, choosing to die rather than desert me.” He briefly smiled. “And he would bemoan my faults with his dying breath.”
Eleanor closed her eyes and imagined scales. Did this man’s code of honor outbalance his rigid interpretation of virtue? Would such a father go so far as to kill his unsatisfactory sons so that the more acceptable Leonel might inherit? Her mind allowed the premise. Her heart could not. “Would he defend his imperfect sons with equal ferocity or does he condemn them as so unworthy that the very earth must protest their feet upon it?”
“Had he not loved his wife so much, he might have claimed they were bastards for he saw none of himself in any. Yet he struggled to accept the merit owned when one tried to please him. I remember the day the eldest labored in the tilting yard to the amusement of all who watched. His lance usually missed the target by the length of a horse, yet he had a quick eye for catching the smallest error in accounting rolls.”
“This was the son who died of fever?”
Hugh nodded. “The baron pulled the lad from the horse, gave the beast to one of his men, and ordered his steward to train the boy in a clerk’s skills. When he left for Acre, he praised the young man for how well he had learned land management, although he made it clear he had wished for a warrior heir.”
“Gervase was the second.”
“As a boy, he cut his finger on a dull knife and never touched a weapon again, clinging instead to a priest’s softer robe. A man of faith, Baron Herbert was pleased enough to send one son to the Church. When he received word that this son was now heir, he roared with mockery. I doubt his letters back to the lad were gentle. When Gervase died, I asked myself if he had suffered unendurable melancholy when he traded the vocation he preferred for one in which he had no skill.”
“You think he committed self-murder by leaping from the window?”
“He lacked a man’s strength and drank too much to soften the world’s sharp edges.”
Eleanor said nothing for a moment and looked around. Except for the two of them, the corridor was empty of all but the bitter wind from the sea. “Then why wait so long after his eldest brother’s death?” she finally said. “He would not have been the first heir to choose a religious vocation, allowing the next-in-line to inherit title and lands. Peter Abelard chose a similar path, although his parents may have valued heavenly objectives more than the baron. They both took vows themselves as well as their son.”
Remembering the seal that Brother Thomas had found, she wondered if the baron had planned a similar retreat from the world. If so, he might have been more sympathetic to Gervase than he would have been in years past. In any case, why would Herbert have wanted to kill a son, albeit a weak one, whose religious vocation he did not condemn?
“I doubt Baron Herbert would have permitted it,” Hugh said. “Roger, the next-in-line, was neither devout nor clever.” Hearing a sound, he looked over his sister’s head. A servant scurried past and disappeared through a nearby door. “As I remember him, he was a dull lad but owned broad shoulders and merry enough ways to charm women into his bed. Most went to him eagerly in those early days, but the brightness of his smile often faded with their pains in bearing his children.”
“He showed no talent with a sword or lance?”
“He was too lazy. The only weapon he enjoyed wielding was the spear between his legs.”
Eleanor put a hand over her mouth to hide her mirth.
“His father abhorred this incontinence. I once overheard the baron shouting that the son had more bastards than the boy knew how to count. The lad next to me whispered that Roger surely had far more than his father knew because the son could not count at all.”
“Neither a man of war nor of God.” Eleanor frowned.
“Nor truly evil either, rather a middling creature, little inclined to adventure outside his chosen vice.”
“Would such a man venture out in a boat on a stormy night? Even to drown himself?”
“He would not have willingly gotten into a boat if Satan had placed a buxom lass with open arms in it. I agree that this death is questionable.”
“And what of poor Umfrey?”
“I knew little of him. He was a mere boy when I was last here.” Suddenly his face paled, and he turned away from her.
“Hugh?”
He remained silent.
“I am your sister, bound to keep your secrets for the love I bear you. As a prioress, I am obliged to treat all human frailties with compassion and justice. Speak. There is nothing you cannot say to me. We are here to solve foul crimes.”
When her brother looked back, his cheeks were red with anger. “I abhor those who mock and belittle others with scornful tales.”
“So do I, but I would hear the stories lest there be something in them of value to this situation.”
“Baron Herbert never spoke this son’s name, and for that reason I fear he had heard the rumors. Umfrey was commonly called the soldier’s wife. He never was a man. I grieve for the shame his father must have suffered.”
After the death of the eldest, the baron was left with a monkish heir, a son of little wit or skill, and one who played the woman with other men. Eleanor took a deep breath. “That leaves Raoul.”
“A whining insect.”
“Raoul was always the youngest?”
“There were no others. No one liked him, but he especially chose to buzz around me when I least wanted him about.”
For a moment, Eleanor saw the annoyed boy her brother must once have been. She almost smiled, despite her grim purpose. “Perhaps he admired you,” she said. “He had no elder brother worthy of emulation. He was too young to catch the interest of a distant father, a man who left England before the lad could even lift a wooden sword in play.”
Hugh stared at her, then turned sheepish. “I confess I treated Raoul no better than I would a midge, swatting him away. He was stubborn. Looking back, he did show more spirit and determination than his elder siblings.” He thought for a moment, then shook his head. “Nonetheless, he was still annoying.”